Dao Divinity Book 1 Read online

  Her eyes traced Dar’s face a dozen times, like she was looking for something, or something to be wrong.

  “You are welcome. Please be more careful. Sasha was quite worried about you.”

  “Did she send you?” Dar was looking for why she’d come, and what had led to the change.

  “No, she was so worried, so I slipped away without her noticing. Everybody expects spirits to be helpless little girls. Maybe it’s because we don’t do well in human society, but I guess it has its perks as well. No one pays me much attention if I just act the part.”

  Cherry curled her hair in her finger and her face went back to the blank, naïve face Dar had come to know.

  “I didn’t realize, Cherry. I hope I haven’t offended you,” Dar said, watching her closely.

  “No. You helped me, after all, and just accepted what I showed you as fact. You seem to not know quite a few things about our world. Curious.”

  Dar didn’t know what to say. He suddenly didn’t trust the Cherry in front of him, if that was really what she called herself. Maybe it wasn’t just part of the act.

  Laughing, she plopped down cross-legged in front of him. “Calm down. I have no reason to harm you. Really, it’s quite the opposite. Either way, you missed a corpse, and now there’s a few annoying birds.”

  Winking at him, she stood up and wandered around the area. “Oh, and don’t forget to at least dunk yourself in the stream before you get back, or your little Sasha will be suspicious.” Cherry stepped back behind the tree and seemed to disappear.

  Dar got up from where he’d been sitting and walked around the tree. She was gone.

  Now he was spooked. Cherry was far more than she appeared to be, but he didn’t think she was an enemy or she wouldn’t have come here and protected him. Not to mention she revealed herself to him and only him.

  He’d deal with that tangled thought later.

  Absorbing the birds and the last direwolf, Dar set off to catch up with the caravan.

  ***

  Still sopping wet, he caught up to the train earlier than he’d expected. With children and elderly townspeople amongst them, the group had to keep to a slower pace, but they seemed to be at a standstill.

  Dar slowed down as he got closer, realizing there was a shouting match going on. He took in the scene as he approached, wanting to be ready for whatever he was about to walk into.

  “I can’t leave him behind!” a woman was wailing, clutching a young man, bleeding and sickly pale, lying on a small wood sled.

  The count was on the other end of the shouting match. “He’s as good as dead! And you are only going to bring the rest of us with him. We need to get to Bellhaven as fast as possible.”

  Count Tint looked at the rest of the crowd. “Leave her behind. Leave anyone who can’t keep up behind! We don’t have time to slow down.”

  Dar stepped up closer, and his height drew a few glances.

  “Where the hell have you been?” the count growled.

  Raising himself tall, Dar wasn’t about to be a pincushion for what was clearly a scared man turning angry.

  The count looked him up and down. “Did you go bathe? Really, in the middle of all this, you went to bathe?”

  That caused a few murmurs and scowling looks shooting his way, but he ignored them.

  Dar shrugged. “It wasn’t like I fell behind.”

  “No, but we need to pick up speed to make it to Bellhaven alive. Break into groups based on how quickly we can move. The first group could even send back soldiers from the city.”

  The count’s eyes were wide with a frantic edge. It was an edge that Dar knew well from other tense situations. It was the look of a man that would ruin his best friend and family if it meant getting out alive. Dar made a mental note to keep a watch on the count.

  “If we break up into multiple groups based on speed, none of you will make it there. Our best strength right now is in numbers, and I’m not about to join the fastest party, so good luck.” Dar crossed his arms, watching as the count bubbled with frustration.

  Scowling, the count stepped forward growling. “I hired you.” He pointed to Sasha. “You and your bodyguard work for me, so when I say hurry up, you hurry up, witch.”

  Dar didn’t wait for Sasha to respond, stepping forward himself, towering over the count. “I don’t have to do a thing you say.”

  “Shut up, Pet. You are not even human as far as I’m concerned. You are nothing more than a monster’s pet. Don’t you dare think you have a right to speak to me.” The count’s voice was pure vitriol.

  Dar paused, tilting his head and studying the count silently. He waited for the man to come down from the rage and realize that he’d just deeply insulted a man much larger than him.

  It was almost possible to see the count’s brain catching up to his mouth as he grew more aggressive and went to take a step forward.

  And that was the moment Dar had been waiting for. Smiling, Dar cocked back his fist and smashed it into the count’s face. The count’s nose crunched, and he lifted off the ground, flying several feet before landing in a heap.

  Ah shit. I did it again. But that felt great.

  Everyone was backing away from him, distancing themselves. But what hurt the most were the looks of fear, like he was some sort of rabid dog off his leash.

  They’d heard the count, but somehow that didn’t matter. The villagers had marked Dar, not Count Tint, as the dangerous one, which was comical given he was one of the few people keeping them alive.

  “He’s alive.” Someone had gone to check on the count. “He’s unconscious though.”

  “Leave him behind. He’ll slow us down,” Dar grumbled.

  But a few people were close enough to hear him and gasped.

  “What? He just said he’d do the same thing to any of you not moments ago, and nobody objected then.” Dar looked at the woman who had been clutching her son when he walked up.

  She was gasping at him like he was a monster.

  Dar grumbled and walked over to the count, picking him up and placing him on the back of one of his horse-drawn carts. “We need to keep moving. Make room for the injured in the carts.”

  The vengeful part of him did want to leave the count behind, but he couldn’t do it on principle. The right thing to do was to bring everybody with them.

  As the train of townspeople started moving again, Dar faded back to Sasha, taking Cherry’s cart from her.

  “He deserved it,” Sasha commented.

  “And they know he did, but yet they look at me like I’m a monster,” Dar grumbled. Feeling the weight of the cart on his arm felt good, like he was doing something again.

  “But we are outsiders,” Sasha reminded him, and Dar had felt the weight of that reality keenly. Every time he tried to move after he fucked up, he was an outsider.

  “Cherry?” Looking over at her, it was obvious the fruit-loving dryad was back to her innocent and cute facade, fawning over the leaves and giggling. But when Dar locked eyes with her, she handed him a few cherries with a clear wink, and her smile grew slightly.

  For whatever reason, she was going to keep up the charade. After seeing how people had treated Sasha and her, Dar assumed it was a defense mechanism. Or at least he hoped it was. She was so good at it; the other options were that she was some sort of assassin or spy.

  But regardless, she seemed like an ally and had let down her defenses in front of him. They both shared secrets now.

  “Thanks.” He took the cherries, feeling the warmth spread to his inner world.

  “You two shouldn’t fret too much,” Cherry added.

  “Thanks, Cherry.” Sasha patted the dryad’s cheeks and took a few fruits as well.

  “She seems to be coming out of her shell pretty well,” Sasha commented as Cherry went back to focusing on her tree.

  “I think she’s smarter than anyone has been giving her credit for.” Dar didn’t upend the dryad’s secrets, but he also thought it would be smart to give Sasha so
me heads up.

  “Oh, spirits are very smart. Just unsocial, most of them don’t live in any sort of organized group,” she explained.

  Dar nodded, not saying anything else. As far as he was concerned, Cherry was their secret weapon.

  People were glancing back his way frequently as they walked, their gazes full of distrust and fear. It was getting to Dar. He even thought about suggesting their small group walk further away from the rest.

  Sasha must have noticed because she bumped her hips with his. “Cheer up, Lug. Just think how angry the count is going to be when he wakes up.”

  Dar snorted. “I think anger is going to be an understatement. Guys like him don’t get punched in the face and not get retaliation.”

  “Even if they needed it,” Sasha added. “Though, I better get my money from him soon. Definitely before we get to the city.”

  “Afraid he’ll renege?” Dar asked.

  The witch nodded, pausing. Anxiety creeped into her posture as she fiddled with one of her ribbons.

  He waited, curious what had made her nervous, but she spoke before he needed to prompt her. “Dar, I need to prepare you before we get to the city. Demons and spirits are not well loved.”

  He smiled, relieved it hadn’t been something more serious. “Yeah, I kind of caught that.”

  “We’ll be tolerated in the city, but that’s about it. We aren’t human and don’t always mix well in their society. If the count tries to get out of our agreement, he will receive wide support. It’s probably half the reason he agreed to the price.” But Sasha didn’t seem disappointed.

  “You are going to ask for some upfront before we hit the city, and that’s all you ever expected to get,” Dar realized.

  Her eyes sparkled with mischief. “We’ll see if I can’t get more than half paid up, once we are a day or two out but still far enough to encounter danger.”

  Thinking back to the encounter earlier, Dar became nervous from that plan. “Be careful, Sasha. He was pretty close to cutting everyone loose today. I hope I knocked some sense into him, but I wouldn’t count on it.”

  “Thanks, Dar.”

  He stumbled for a moment, caught off guard. She had called him by his name.

  Chapter 8

  By the next day, tensions with the townspeople had eased. Sasha was off chatting with other girls and generally being helpful to the group.

  Several of the makeshift sleds were now sporting small enchantments to help make the trip easier. Courtesy of Sasha, it was apparently a big deal for a commoner to have something enchanted.

  Count Tint had woken up and stayed sullen, retreating to his cart for most of the day. Dar had no doubt the man would try to find a way to get even at some point, but at least for now, he was being quiet.

  It wasn’t worth worrying about.

  “You’ve been quiet.” Cherry leaned on him from the cart bed as he pulled it forward. Her chest pushed comfortably into his back, the uneven ground causing them to bounce lightly against him.

  “You are being talkative. No cherries?” he teased, seeing her eyes roll.

  In response, a handful of little red fruits appeared over his shoulder. But he didn’t take them; instead, he opened his mouth wide.

  “You aren’t serious?” she scoffed and waited a moment.

  Dar just smiled, enjoying messing with her. It wasn’t like he had anything better to do, so he just continued walking, one hand pulling the cart and his mouth wide open.

  “You’ll catch flies like that,” Cherry prodded. The uncertainty behind her annoyance amused him, so he waited, pushing her a bit further.

  Dar wanted to test a theory. He knew the cute, naïve girl was an act, but he wanted to know how much of everything else was. Did she really enjoy giving people these cherries?

  After a minute of silence, she started feeding him the cherries, and he could feel her relax on his shoulder as she did. “I hate you a little right now,” she grumbled.

  Dar cleared his throat of the food, his question answered. “Why do you like to give people the cherries?”

  “It’s about spreading my tree’s seed—don’t ask. I have no idea why it makes me so happy, but it does, and it was part of my original dao.”

  “Which was?” He remembered Sasha had said it was a rude question to ask, but he really didn’t see why. It was part of who they were.

  “Fresh growth, the green shoots on a tree, the budding of a seed,” Cherry explained. “So, spreading my tree’s seed was in many ways part of the dao that birthed me.”

  “Huh, do all spirits have such quirks?”

  He felt Cherry smile. “You think I’m quirky?”

  “Yeah, you’re cute too.” Dar cocked his head to see her and let his eyes wander over her face. The small nose and her bowed lips were perfectly symmetrical in a way that made her look more like a piece of art. Her hair loosely braided with cherry blossoms.

  “You know I’m old enough to be your great-great-grandmother, plus another dozen or so greats.” Cherry smiled back at him despite her words.

  “Doesn’t stop me from appreciating your beauty,” he said.

  Cherry snorted and wrinkled her cute nose. “Cad.” But a slight blush swept across her cheeks.

  “So, do spirits and demons partner up with humans often?” He asked the question that had been on his mind.

  But his perky little dryad frowned. “Sometimes for pleasure, but rarely for a commitment. Your life is like a blooming flower. It’s short and pretty, but not something a person that lives longer would want to attach themself to.”

  “What if I wanted something more serious?” he asked, pushing her.

  “You’d hurt her in a few decades, and it would be bad. It isn’t easy to watch the world go by without you,” Cherry warned him, her eyes darting over to Sasha.

  Sighing, Dar just nodded. It was the answer he’d anticipated but not the one he’d been hoping for. His body had all but won the battle to make a move on Sasha last night but wanting more than just that one moment had stopped him.

  He was still getting to know her, but she didn’t seem like the type to sleep with and forget. He could feel there was more to her, and he wanted to dig it out.

  “If I were to learn a dao, would it work?” he asked.

  “We don’t know, Dar. Your enchantments might even help you live longer, but all we know right now is that things that walk their dao path become very long lived. In theory, if you stepped on a dao path, there would be hope. But it hasn’t really been done before by a human.”

  “Would I technically be a demon then?” he wondered aloud.

  Cherry bobbed her head side to side on his shoulder in thought before settling on an answer. “I guess it wouldn’t be that different from the bull back in town. So, sort of, but you’d also be one of the first creatures to choose their first step on the dao path.”

  Nearly pausing in his next step, Dar processed that. He hadn’t thought about it until she’d mentioned it. Both demons and spirits didn’t get much of a choice on their first dao. It was both an awesome opportunity and a terrifying choice.

  Trying to pick an occupation for your life was tough enough; this was even more permanent.

  “If I told you I was nearly certain I could learn a dao, what would you think?”

  Cherry gave him a look through narrowed eyes. “I’d think you better be careful saying something like that. No one is immune to that sort of temptation. I’d advise you to not even tell me or Sasha that.”

  Dar nodded. “Right.”

  Cherry looked him over again. He could swear she was looking for something, a flaw or a mark.

  “Why do you keep looking at me like that?”

  “You look like someone I knew long, long ago. Someone who gave people hope. I keep having to remind myself you aren’t him, but every time I look for something off about you to remind myself, I can’t find it,” Cherry said, her eyes wandering over him again.

  Her face stayed skeptical as she continue
d. “It’s hard to believe it’s a coincidence, but I guess with enough permutations there’s bound to be a doppelganger or two across the ages. Your name even reminds me of him.”

  Dar hesitated. Did Cherry know him before he died? Back when Lilith and he were together?

  “Did you know Lilith?” He tried to say it casually, but he was excited there might be somebody else who knew his past.

  Cherry’s brows pressed down. “That’s a very interesting question given what I just said. A man I once knew died over a thousand years ago, before humans built cities and created. Before humans were writing their history.”

  A thousand years? Lilith had made it seem like a short time… just how old was she?

  She leveled a look riddled with curiosity at Dar. “Yes, I knew Lilith. We were dao companions and shared that man. That is until he died and a rift formed between our little group.”

  Dar couldn’t help it as he widened his mouth in surprise.

  “Don’t be so shocked. After you live long enough, you find pleasure where you can. It isn’t uncommon for a small group of demons and spirits to work together and walk their dao side by side. There are a number of benefits to it too.”

  He wanted to get back to the reason he’d asked about Lilith. Dar needed to know more about the person that had brought him back and why she’d had so much hope in him being able to take on the devils. “What was Lilith like?”

  Cherry tilted her head. “Some questions you ask make it seem like you know more than you’re letting on, but others show complete ignorance of anything. It makes no sense.”

  “Guess I’m just a conundrum.” Dar smirked.

  “One I’m quite keen on figuring out. After all, you are marked up with Lilith’s runes.” She looked at his neck. “Haven’t seen some of these in a long time. But to answer your question, Lilith was just innately curious. She was always trying to learn and figure things out. I guess it went with her dao quite well.”

  “What was her dao?” he asked, certainly as famous as she was, her dao had to be powerful. Maybe it would give him a hint as to where to start.